1 Kings 20:25

And number thee an army, like the army that thou hast lost, horse for horse, and chariot for chariot: and we will fight against them in the plain, and surely we shall be stronger than they. And he hearkened unto their voice, and did so.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

20:22-30 Those about Benhadad advised him to change his ground. They take it for granted that it was not Israel, but Israel's gods, that beat them; but they speak very ignorantly of Jehovah. They supposed that Israel had many gods, to whom they ascribed limited power within a certain district; thus vain were the Gentiles in their imaginations concerning God. The greatest wisdom in worldly concerns is often united with the most contemptible folly in the things of God.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The Syrian chiefs evidently thought that want of unity had weakened their army. They therefore proposed the deposition of the kings, and the substitution, in their place, of Syrian governors: not "captains." The term used always denotes a civil office.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

22-26. the prophet came to the king of Israel, and said—The same prophet who had predicted the victory shortly reappeared, admonishing the king to take every precaution against a renewal of hostilities in the following campaign.

at the return of the year—that is, in spring, when, on the cessation of the rainy season, military campaigns (2Sa 11:1), were anciently begun. It happened as the prophet had forewarned. Brooding over their late disastrous defeat, the attendants of Ben-hadad ascribed the misfortune to two causes—the one arose from the principles of heathenism which led them to consider the gods of Israel as "gods of the hills"; whereas their power to aid the Israelites would be gone if the battle was maintained on the plains. The other cause to which the Syrian courtiers traced their defeat at Samaria, was the presence of the tributary kings, who had probably been the first to take flight; and they recommended "captains to be put in their rooms." Approving of these recommendations, Ben-hadad renewed his invasion of Israel the next spring by the siege of Aphek in the valley of Jezreel (compare 1Sa 29:1, with 1Sa 28:4), not far from En-dor.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And number thee an army like the army that thou hast lost,.... Raise an army of an equal number, which they supposed he was able to do:

horse for horse and chariot for chariot; as many horses and chariots as he had before:

and we will fight against them in the plain; where they could make use of their horses and chariots to greater advantage than on hills and mountains, see Judges 1:19.

and surely we shall be stronger than they; and beat them:

and he hearkened unto their voice, and did so; took their counsel, and prepared an army, and placed captains in it instead of kings.

Geneva Study Bible

And number thee an army, like the army that thou hast lost, horse for horse, and chariot for chariot: and we will fight against them in the plain, and surely we shall be stronger than they. And he hearkened unto their voice, and did so.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

25. and number thee an army] Here we have a different verb from that in 15 and in 26, 27. Here the operation is one of numbering, making the force tally exactly in each arm with that which had been gathered in the previous year. The rendering of this verb by ‘number’ is an additional reason for changing ‘number’ to muster in the other places.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 25. — And number thee an army, like the army that thou hast lost [Heb. that is fallen from thee, not as marg., that was fallen. For the form מֵאותָך. see Ewald, 264 b)], horse for [Heb. as] horse, and chariot for chariot: and we will fight against them in the plain, and surely we shall be stronger than they. And he hearkened unto their voice, and did so. 1 Kings 20:25

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The Second Victory. - 1 Kings 20:23, 1 Kings 20:24. The servants (ministers) of Benhadad persuaded their lord to enter upon a fresh campaign, attributing the defeat they had sustained to two causes, which could be set aside, viz., to the supposed nature of the gods of Israel, and to the position occupied by the vassal-kings in the army. The gods of Israel were mountain gods: when fighting with them upon the mountains, the Syrians had had to fight against and succumb to the power of these gods, whereas on the plain they would conquer, because the power of these gods did not reach so far. This notion concerning the God of Israel the Syrians drew, according to their ethnical religious ideas, from the fact that the sacred places of this God - not only the temple at Jerusalem upon Moriah, but also the altars of the high places - were erected upon mountains; since heathenism really had its mountain deities, i.e., believed in gods who lived upon mountains and protected and conducted all that took place upon them (cf. Dougtaei Analect. ss. i. 178,179; Deyling, Observv. Songs 3.pp. 97ff.; Winer, bibl. R. W. i. p. 154), and in Syrophoenicia even mountains themselves had divine honours paid to them (vid., Movers, Phniz. i. p. 667ff.). The servants of Benhadad were at any rate so far right, that they attributed their defeat to the assistance which God had given to His people Israel; and were only wrong in regarding the God of Israel as a local deity, whose power did not extend beyond the mountains. They also advised their lord (1 Kings 20:24) to remove the kings in his army from their position, and appoint governors in their stead (פּחות, see 1 Kings 10:15). The vassal-kings had most likely not shown the desired self-sacrifice for the cause of their superior in the war. And, lastly (1 Kings 20:25), they advised the king to raise his army to its former strength, and then carry on the war in the plain. "Number thyself an army, like the army which has fallen from thee." מאותך, "from with thee," rendered correctly de tuis in the Vulgate, at least so far as the sense is concerned (for the form see Ewald, 264, b.). But these prudently-devised measures were to be of no avail to the Syrians; for they were to learn that the God of Israel was not a limited mountain-god.